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Australian Olive Riley, the world's oldest blogger has died aged 108, 12/07/2008

An Australian Lady who was hailed as the world’s oldest blogger has died aged 108. In her blog, Olive Riley shared her life experiences and thoughts on modern life and since her blog ‘worldsoldestblogger.blogspot.com’ went live in 2007, Riley had compassionately written and posted over 70 entries.

During her time, Riley took various jobs, including work as an egg-sorter and a barmaid. She also raised three children and witnessed several life changing events including two World Wars and the Great Depression. Although Riley’s blog may not be the most long standing blog on the net, its the diversity of stories that span over a century that make her articles so special.

In her last entry on June 26Th, Riley describes singing a happy song with nurses and a visitor. Just over two weeks later on July 12Th, Riley passed away in her New South Wales Nursing Home. A thoughtful note on her website reads,

“Our dear friend Olive Riley passed away peacefully… She will be mourned by thousands of Internet friends and hundreds of descendants and other relatives,”

In her final post written at the nursing him in the town of Woy Woy, she wrote:

“I can’t believe I’ve been here in this nursing home for more than a week…
“How the days have flown, even though I’ve been in bed most the time. I still feel weak, and can’t shake off that bad cough….
“I’ve never been treated so well in all my life. The nurses can’t do enough for me,”

On Australia’s ABC News, documentary maker Mike Rubbo said that Riley took up blogging because a friend had suggested it. Rubbo said,

“[The friend] suggested that Ollie could blog so we put it to her and explained what a blog was and then I undertook to do all the sort of leg work…
“It was great fun and it was great too to probe her memory more deeply and you get ever more stories about her past, many of which of course were set in Broken Hill,”

Olive Riley’s great-grandson was proud of her long life, he said blogging had brought her into contact with people from around the world and that had helped keep her mind fresh.